The Red Bulletin

One lesson that many people learn as they progress through life: Chasing your dreams is less like a towering ladder and more like a roller coaster ride full of ups and downs. Another is that the most meaningful successes often come on the heels of setbacks you weren’t expecting. The issue you’re holding is full of stories that bring these lessons to life with cinematic drama. The opening chapter highlights three iconic athletes who are entering the third or possibly fourth act of their incomparable careers. First up is Lindsey Vonn, one of the greatest ski racers in U.S. history. When she retired in 2019 with chronic knee problems, she had nothing left to prove, walking away with 82 World Cup wins and 11 World Championship and Olympic medals to…

PHOTOGRAPHER MICHAEL MULLER “I’ve had the honor of photographing Lindsey Vonn for two decades,” notes the Los Angeles–based photographer. The issue you’re holding represents the third cover of Vonn that Muller has shot. “Out of thousands of women I’ve worked with, there’s truly only one LV. I’ve seen her react to everything—I’ve even seen her get thrown off a horse.” Muller’s clients include Vanity Fair, Elle, Esquire, Marvel, Samsung and The New York Times Magazine. Page 10 PHOTOGRAPHER ARTO SAARI “I know this wasn’t Carissa’s first rodeo, but I was blown away by her professionalism and humility,” says the Oahu-based photographer, who shot our fitness story on surf legend (and new mom) Carissa Moore. “I had such a great time making pictures with the champ.” Saari, who published a photo…

Sometimes, the only way to appreciate raw speed is to slow it down. Especially when it comes to downhilling. Then you can see just much how a pair of highly engineered 7-foot-long racing skis—wood at the core; layers of stiff, light titanal and graphene laminates; steel-alloy edges honed by bastard files and gummy stones—vibrates and carves and chatters across fall lines that have been injected with water from high-pressure nozzles, milled by grooming machines and then frozen solid. You can see how human quadriceps push through the competing forces of a sweeping off-camber turn. You can see how an unlucky gust of wind, or a fraction of a degree in the angles of a ski’s bevel, can translate into milliseconds—the difference between a World Cup podium and empty hands. Even…

I stood on the start line of the Leadville 100 in the predawn dark, trying to slow my heart rate and stay as calm as possible. I’d been in this situation so many times before, waiting for a race to begin, but in certain ways, even after more than a decade as a professional mountain bike racer, I felt like I had never been here before. And I found freedom in that unknown. A series of unexpected events had led me to this start line. Less than 10 weeks earlier, I had been in Austria preparing to compete in the next three rounds of the UCI Mountain Bike World Series. But after a broken wrist, travel home for surgery, a brief existential crisis and a pivot, I found myself lining…

Carissa Moore Surfer One of the greatest surfers of all time, Moore has five WSL championships and was the first-ever Olympic gold medalist in women’s surfing. High in the hills of Honolulu, the home of professional surfer Carissa Moore is the picture of serenity. The open-air design in the heart of the house provides a stunning view of lush vegetation that surrounds a cantilevered deck where the five-time world champion and Olympic gold medalist readies herself for a morning interview in early October. Just seven months ago, Moore gave birth to her first child, a daughter named ‘Olena. And seven months before that, she made what many assumed was her final appearance as a competitive surfer in Tahiti for the 2024 Olympics, after announcing earlier that year that she would…

It’s 12:30 p.m. on a Friday afternoon in early October and Igloo Ice Rink in Mount Laurel, New Jersey, is quiet. You can imagine that in a few hours the place will be overrun with kids coming in for skate lessons or hockey practice before adult rec leagues face off. But right now, there’s no one behind the front desk. A couple of people skate in the Blue Rink, while across the way in the Red Rink, someone is driving a Zamboni in circles. The gate is pulled down over the snack bar situated between the two rinks, and the surrounding tables are empty. A lone gentleman works on a laptop at the counter stretching along the window overlooking the rink. After the Zamboni makes one final pass, three young…